Some 226 awards have been made under the Advice Services Transition Fund for frontline legal not-for-profit agencies. The scheme is run by BIG (Big Lottery Fund) and the Cabinet Office which contributes half of the funding.

• The Advice Services Transition Fund was launched in October 2012 making grants of between £50,000 and £350,000 to be spent over two years. You can read a full list of the awards HERE.
• You can read Phil Jew, head of policy and campaigns at AdviceUK on the fund elsewhere on LegalVoice HERE.

According to BIG, the funding aims ‘to help address that immediate need but will also help strengthen organisations for the demands that lay ahead’. ‘Times are tough for advice providers and for people at the thin end of the wedge,’ said Dharmendra Kanani, Big Lottery fund director for England. ‘This is a chance to invest in a much needed transformation of services so that they can adapt, respond to need and survive.’

BIG flagged up Barnet Citizens Advice Bureau which will receive over £336,000 ‘to establish a new weekly evening law clinic staffed by solicitors and trainee solicitors on a pro bono basis’. It was claimed that the new project would support an additional 7,000 people in Barnet over two years and provide legal advice to vulnerable groups as well as support the extension of Advice Barnet Project helpline to cope with increased demand to help improve quality of advice locally.

‘At the heart of our Service are over 22,000 volunteers who devote their time and expertise for free, week after week to advise people who are struggling to pay their bills, feed their family and feel they have nowhere else to turn,’ said Gillian Guy, chief executive of Citizens Advice. ‘Citizens Advice Bureaux are working hard to find new ways to fund and deliver the important support we provide in communities across Britain.’